What causes differences in achievement in Zimbabwe's secondary schools?

The authors found that students who attended high-fee-paying (trust) schools, elite urban governments schools, and mission schools scored better in mathematics and English achievement than did students in the less-well-endowed government schools and those established by local councils. Much of the variation in the student achievement was attributable to the schools the student attended. Examination results were higher in schools with a high proportion of trained teachers, with a good supply of textbooks, and with a stable faculty (high teacher retention). But once researcher control for these factors, contrary to expectations, some underendowed local council and government schools are more effective at boosting achievement than their counterparts with more resources. So, textbooks and teachers are important in raising achievement, but more research is needed into what characteristics differentiate high-achieving schools from low-achieving schools.Teaching and Learning,Gender and Education,Primary Education,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Girls Education

Monitoring the Performance of Educational Programmes in Developing Countries

Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

The effectiveness of foreign aid to education: What can be learned?

This article reviews what has been learned over many decades of foreign aid to education and discusses what works and what does not work. It shows the positive contribution that aid has made to education in aid-recipient countries, the most tangible outcome of which is the contribution that aid makes to expanding enrolments especially of basic education. But the article also indicates that there is a considerable gap between what aid does and what it could potentially achieve, especially in relation to its contribution to improvements in educational quality. It shows the distortions caused by focusing on enrolments and insufficiently on quality. Sustainable education outcomes will not be achieved merely by reproducing yet more successful, but individual projects. Perversely, development agencies which focus only on demonstrable short-term impact may well be contributing, unwittingly, to an undermining of long-term impact on the education systems and their deepening development, to whose progress they are trying to contribute

Social Media Ethos: Raising Awareness about Communication Center Programs and Outreach through the Use of Twitter

Communication centers often develop a social media presence to engage with audiences about services, programs, and strategies. Twitter, as a popular social media platform, has been adopted by many communication centers. In this article, researchers from the Eastern Kentucky University (EKU) Noel Studio for Academic Creativity share strategies, best practices, and analysis for using Twitter tags, hashtags, and geotags to engage with different publics.

Effect of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor and angiotensin receptor blocker initiation on organ support-free days in patients hospitalized with COVID-19

IMPORTANCE Overactivation of the renin-angiotensin system (RAS) may contribute to poor clinical outcomes in patients with COVID-19. Objective To determine whether angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitor or angiotensin receptor blocker (ARB) initiation improves outcomes in patients hospitalized for COVID-19. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS In an ongoing, adaptive platform randomized clinical trial, 721 critically ill and 58 non–critically ill hospitalized adults were randomized to receive an RAS inhibitor or control between March 16, 2021, and February 25, 2022, at 69 sites in 7 countries (final follow-up on June 1, 2022). INTERVENTIONS Patients were randomized to receive open-label initiation of an ACE inhibitor (n = 257), ARB (n = 248), ARB in combination with DMX-200 (a chemokine receptor-2 inhibitor; n = 10), or no RAS inhibitor (control; n = 264) for up to 10 days. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES The primary outcome was organ support–free days, a composite of hospital survival and days alive without cardiovascular or respiratory organ support through 21 days. The primary analysis was a bayesian cumulative logistic model. Odds ratios (ORs) greater than 1 represent improved outcomes. RESULTS On February 25, 2022, enrollment was discontinued due to safety concerns. Among 679 critically ill patients with available primary outcome data, the median age was 56 years and 239 participants (35.2%) were women. Median (IQR) organ support–free days among critically ill patients was 10 (–1 to 16) in the ACE inhibitor group (n = 231), 8 (–1 to 17) in the ARB group (n = 217), and 12 (0 to 17) in the control group (n = 231) (median adjusted odds ratios of 0.77 [95% bayesian credible interval, 0.58-1.06] for improvement for ACE inhibitor and 0.76 [95% credible interval, 0.56-1.05] for ARB compared with control). The posterior probabilities that ACE inhibitors and ARBs worsened organ support–free days compared with control were 94.9% and 95.4%, respectively. Hospital survival occurred in 166 of 231 critically ill participants (71.9%) in the ACE inhibitor group, 152 of 217 (70.0%) in the ARB group, and 182 of 231 (78.8%) in the control group (posterior probabilities that ACE inhibitor and ARB worsened hospital survival compared with control were 95.3% and 98.1%, respectively). CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE In this trial, among critically ill adults with COVID-19, initiation of an ACE inhibitor or ARB did not improve, and likely worsened, clinical outcomes. TRIAL REGISTRATION ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT0273570

School effectiveness in secondary education in Zimbabwe : a multilevel analysis

Survey data was collected in 1985 covering information on\ud 3,1100 Form IV students in Zimbabwe, their teachers, their\ud classes and the 32 schools from which they were drawn - spread across six different school types. This data is analysed using a multilevel regression programme to evaluate the effectiveness of different schools in terms of '0' level results in English Language, English Literature and Mathematics. In Chapter One, the historical background to education in Zimbabwe is presented, together with an overview of the main policy changes since Independence. The study itself is situated in Chapter Two against the backdrop of a review of the literature and a discussion of the methodology which distinguishes this study as part of the third wave of research into school effectiveness. Chapter Three describes the study itself, the sample, the variables, and an overview of the school type differences. Chapter Four details the construction of the index variables at the student, the class and the school level. In Chapter Five the results of the progression of linear models are presented, substantiating the choice of 'final' models for each eub3ect. Chapter Six presents an analysis of the different costs at different types of schools, and Chapter Seven draws the threads through the arguments presented in Chapters Two. Five and Six, presenting\ud the implications for Zimbabwe of the stud y 's findings as well as the implications for further research in this field.\ud Whereas much of the literature on school effectiveness has\ud assumed that family background influences on educational\ud achievement operate differently in Third World countries\ud relative to industrialised countries and that school-based\ud factors predominate, this study demonstrates the inadequacy of the models on which such conclusions have been based and\ud concludes that such a distinct pattern of educational\ud achievement for the Third World may indeed be a fallacy.\u

Winners or Losers? NGOs in the Current Aid Paradigm

Catherine Agg examines the trends in non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and asks if the ‘golden age’ of NGOs is behind us? Although NGOs have become increasingly important actors in development policies in the last two decades, current donor rhetoric stresses the need to work with recipient governments to reduce poverty. She examines the extent to which recent policy developments have affected the standing of NGOs, looking at (i) the proportion of ODA channelled to the NGO sector by the main bilateral donors; (ii) funding trends for individual NGOs. She presents a mixed picture in terms of funding trends, pointing to a change for INGOs in the current development paradigm rather than their demise. Development (2006) 49, 15–21. doi:10.1057/palgrave.development.1100252